Quiet Ghosts

He did not have a name,because he was dead. He could remember little of his past life, but he recalled the face of a girl whom he had very much wanted to meet. He drifted from town to town, over many countries, until eventually he found her in a hotel room. He was invisible to most people, but she could see him.
   "Hello!" she said, "Who are you?" She was not in the least bit frightened.
   "I don't know", he replied. "I just wanted to be with you". It was strange that they could understand each other,since they spoke different languages.
   She said, "Tomorrow I have to fly to America. I would like it if you could come with me".

They boarded the plane and he watched over her until she fell asleep. He then drifted along the cabin and into the cockpit. None of the passengers saw him, but the pilot did. With a sudden scream of fright the pilot drew a small automatic pistol and fired several shots. They passed harmlessly through him and punctured the fuselage of the aircraft. It immediately depressurized and plunged downwards into the waters of the Atlantic.
    There were no survivors of the disaster, but he and the girl drifted contentedly together through the world until they had both forgotten who they had been.  

Cinderella: An attempt at a pantomime script!

Cast in order of appearance:

Lord Chamberlain

Cinderella

Baron Hardup

Gertrude (first ugly sister)

Marguerita (second ugly sister)

Page

……………………………………………………………………….

(Sound of bell ringing. Door opening)

Lord Chamberlain: Is your master in, child?

Cinderella: Yes, sir: I’ll fetch him (she exits)

Chamb: (aside) If she’d wash the dirt off her face, she’d be quite a pretty little thing

(Footsteps)

Cind: Here’s a visitor, father. (Cinderella exits)

Baron Hardup: What can I do for you, my man? You haven’t come with a bill, have you? Because I’ve explained: I will pay everything in full; it’s just that right now …..

Chamb: Do you have any daughters living in the house, Baron? It’s them I need to see.

Bar: They haven’t been ordering more dresses and jewellery, have they? It really is too bad! I’ve told them again and again that I won’t be responsible for their debts, and they simply take no notice! Can’t you tell them? They might listen to you!

Chamb: Baron, I am not a debt collector. I am Lord Chamberlain to His Majesty the King. What I have to say to your daughters could be greatly to their advantage, and yours. Just call them, please.

Bar: Oh, your grace! However could I have made such a stupid mistake! (Claps hands) Gertrude! Marguerita! You’ve got a very important visitor!

Chamb: (aside) Idiot!

Gertrude and Marguerita (enter, chattering) What’s happening? Who’s this?

Chamb: (aside) Good grief, what a hideous pair! Still, orders are orders. (aloud) Young ladies, I come on a mission of the highest importance. At the ball last night, His Royal Highness Prince Charming danced with a mysterious young princess, who then unaccountably vanished, leaving only a single slipper. His Royal Highness was so taken with the beauty of the said princess that he has vowed to wed her as soon as she may be found. To this end, I am commanded to ask every young lady in the city to try on the aforementioned slipper until the true wearer can be identified. Let us therefore proceed. Page: the slipper!

Page: Here, sir.

Gert. and Marg. (together): Me first! Stop pushing! Out of the way! Ow!

Gert: Give it here, you moron! (Grunts and groans as she tries on slipper)

Chamb: It’s clearly far too small for you. (aside) That’s a relief!

Gert: It’s my feet! I danced so much last night they’ve swollen! It would fit normally.

Marg: My turn now! (Grunts and groans)                                                  

Chamb: It doesn’t fit you either

Marg: I think I’ve developed a bunion

Chamb: (aside) I can’t imagine the Prince would be disappointed to hear that. (aloud) Well, Baron, I’m afraid these two don’t qualify. Are there any more young ladies in your household? What about the girl who answered the door?

Gert: Oh, she’s nobody

Marg: Just a servant. Besides, she wasn’t at the ball: she was here, working in the kitchen.

Chamb: But, Baron, didn’t I hear her addressing you as father?

Bar: Well, yes, there is another daughter. Her name’s Cinderella. But she doesn’t get out much. Too shy, you know.

Gert: You’d be wasting your time.

Chamb: Nevertheless, Baron, His Royal Highness has commanded me to try the slipper with every young girl in the city. So would you be good enough to call Cinderella in here? (aside) It’s no more than a very long shot, but I’m going to do it anyway, if only to annoy these two revolting hussies and their ridiculous father!

Bar: Cinderella! (claps hands)

(Cinderella enters)

Bar: Cinderella, the gentleman here wants you to try on a slipper

Cind: Yes, father

Gert: Look who’ll be getting a swelled head!

Marg: She’ll be insufferable after this!

(Short pause)

Page: Oh look sir! The slipper fits her perfectly!

Gert and Marg: Oh!

Chamb: So it does! Well, well! Cinderella, you must answer me truthfully: were you at the ball last night?

Cind: Yes I was, sir, and I danced with the Prince; but at midnight I had to run away, and I was in such a hurry that this slipper came off my foot and I didn’t have time to pick it up.

Gert. and Marg: (together) But she can’t have been! It’s not possible!

Chamb: (aside) Hmm. With a decent hairdresser and dressmaker she could be made to look quite presentable. The Prince could do a lot worse. The next step must be to get her away from her appalling family. (aloud) Now, Cinderella, your whole life is about to change. You must come with me to the palace. No need to pick anything up; we’re leaving immediately!

Bar: Just a moment, your grace. If you’re taking my beloved little girl to meet the Prince, I don’t suppose you could find your way to lend her poor old father the odd fiver, could you?

Teddy

The child threw her teddy-bear which
came bouncing towards 
me. It had wild
ferocious eyes and its
mouth was open; its teeth
sharp and hungry.

I have had this dream several times, and each time I have woken up in alarm at this point. But what if, on some future occasion, I am still asleep when the teddy-bear reaches me?

At the seaside

“I have come to the sea. I hate the sea”.

     He had much the same thought every year. There was so much about the seaside that he disliked. The strange and unpleasant fishy smells. The way sand got everywhere when the wind blew: into his eyes, his hair, his clothes: all very irritating for a fastidious gentleman. The perpetual taste of salt on his lips. Not to mention the extortionate prices charged by mediocre hotels in the holiday season. 

     But of course there were compensations. He would be sure to meet some attractive young girls, and with luck their mothers would allow him to photograph them, and to write to them afterwards. It would all be very pleasant. But in his heart he knew that any such episode would be no more than a doomed attempt to recapture the joy of a lost love from the past, which now survived only in memory. Here he was, a middle-aged gentleman, moderately successful and prosperous, with plenty of friends, but afflicted with a gnawing feeling of loneliness. 

    Fortunately, he never remained despondent for long. While he was collecting together the toys to attract the attention of children, he ran through in his mind a jokey little poem about his dislike of the seaside, and before he set out for the beach he jotted it down. He signed it, as was his wont, “Lewis Carroll".

Dreaming and Waking

There was a man in Carolina who
had a Diplodocus which he
bought at a pet store because
the shopkeeper thought it
was an alligator, but it
grew to an enormous size and devastated
the country for miles around
but soon people came from
all over the world to
see the monster, and his attorneys who were
called Magree and Graeme initiated complex
lawsuits on his behalf and so the
man and the Diplodocus lived happily
ever after.

.............................................................

But I'm not sure I really believe this story. Quite apart from the fact that the Diplodocus became extinct tens of millions of years ago, I don't see how anyone could possibly mistake a baby one for an alligator. The whole thing is most improbable. Even the names of the lawyers are only anagrams of each other. Nevertheless, I would like to believe that he really did have a Diplodocus. 

Why teenagers shouldn't necessarily be encouraged to write! (Part 2)

When I was about 16 I began to write a novel by post with Ted, an old friend. We were living in different parts of the country by this time, so I would write a chapter and post it to him, and he would then write a following chapter and post it back. We continued this until we were in our early twenties, and both at university. Another mutual friend, David, also made contributions. The work went under the title of "The life and epic adventures of Cecil Z. Frampton, Gent." - showing the influence of Henry Fielding: other influences including Sherlock Holmes, Francois Rabelais and science fiction. It was eventually abandoned unfinished. I discovered the manuscript several years later, and I think I can say, in all honesty, that it was pretty bad. Ted's contributions were on the whole rather better than mine.
     There are two problems with teenage writing. One is that teenagers are unlikely to have a style of their own, and instead are unduly influenced by the style of other writers; often producing a pastiche verging on parody. The other is that teenagers usually don't have much to write about that would be of interest to non-teenage readers. It is very noticeable that a large number of first novels by young writers are about how they were misunderstood at school; often focusing on how they were no good at maths. Ted and I at least managed to avoid this: we both did well at school and were good at maths. Nevertheless, almost all the characters were closely based on our teachers and school-friends, and the plot was sheerest fantasy.
    I still have the manuscript of  "Cecil Z. Frampton", but I doubt if it will be released on an unsuspecting public.
   Oh, and we really did enjoy writing it!  

Frizzy and Jack: a story for children

When they had settled into their new home, Jack’s mother decided she would like a dog, and, Jack agreed, so they went round to the local Dog Rescue centre. Mother’s eye was caught by a small, bedraggled-looking creature. She immediately felt sorry for him.

“Isn’t he sweet!” she said, “What’s his name?”

“I don’t think he has a name he would recognize”, said the man who was showing them round, “He was very badly mistreated by his previous owner, and at the moment he doesn’t trust anyone”.

“Does he bite?”

“No; he’s just very scared of everyone he meets”.

“Well, I’d like to take him home and look after him!”

Jack’s father, who was not interested in dogs, thought he would go along with his wife’s wishes, and Jack agreed, though secretly he had hoped for a much bigger dog.

Jack said, “I shall call him Frizzy, because of his hair!”

At first, Frizzy was very mistrustful of his new family, but after a while he became used to them. He was a very affectionate little dog. When he saw Jack sitting on a chair, he liked to jump up on his lap and lick his face, which tickled Jack and made him giggle. But Jack was less pleased when he discovered that Frizzy was very timid. He was frightened of other dogs, and backed away from them when they barked at him. There was a big chocolate-coloured labrador living not far away, which barked and shook its garden gate jumping at it whenever it saw Frizzy, who was most reluctant to pass the house. Father said that the Labrador was only trying to be friendly, and that Frizzy had probably been bullied by other dogs at the rescue centre, and would eventually get over it. But Jack was not convinced. He was rather shy at taking Frizzy for a walk, because he was afraid his friends from school might laugh at him.

 “Why do you call them your friends if you’re afraid they’ll laugh at you?” said Father. “You’re not exactly being particularly brave yourself!” Jack said nothing: he knew father wouldn’t understand.

One Sunday afternoon Jack decided he would take Frizzy out and force him to be brave. He put him on the lead and deliberately led him past the house where the fierce labrador lived. As usual, they were greeted with wild barking and the big dog jumping against the garden gate, rattling it. Frizzy tugged at the lead and wanted to go straight home again, but Jack told him there was nothing to be scared of and dragged him past. They walked on to the end of the town and came to a field of cows. Although they had never been in the field, Jack knew that Frizzy would be afraid of the cows; but he wanted to teach him to be brave so he opened the gate and went in.

They hadn’t gone very far before the cows noticed them. Cows do not like dogs in their field, and they quickly gathered round in a menacing fashion. Now it was Jack’s turn to be frightened. He realized with alarm that their route back to the gate was cut off. Frizzy suddenly fled with such force that the lead was snatched from Jack’s hand, and sprinted for some woodland on the far side of the field; and Jack, panicking just as much, followed as fast as he could.

There was a fence. Frizzy found a gap between the railings and slipped through it. Jack clambered over the fence, but when he jumped down on the far side he felt a sudden agonizing pain in his ankle and collapsed on the ground. He lay there, panting. The cows stood looking at them for a while, but then lost interest and wandered off.

Jack tried to stand up, but found he couldn’t. His ankle was extremely painful, and must have been badly damaged. There was no way he could walk home. He realized he hadn’t told his parents where he was going. There was no-one about. What was he going to do?

For a while he laid on the ground in despair. Frizzy, not knowing anything was wrong, licked his face. This gave Jack an idea. “Frizzy”, he said, “You must help me! You must run home and let father and mother know where I am. I’ll write a note and tie it to your collar so they’ll know”. He felt his pockets, but discovered he had neither pencil nor paper. What was he going to do now?

There was only one small hope. He took off his watch and threaded it through Frizzy’s collar. Frizzy licked his face again.

“No, Frizzy! Not now! Go home! Run! Good dog! Run home and lead them back here! Home!”

Frizzy suddenly set off at a great rate, through the fence and across the field before the cows had time to notice, through the gate and onto the road, out of Jack’s sight. All he could do now was wait and hope for the best.

Jack’s mother and father heard Frizzy’s frantic barking. “Thank goodness!” said Mother, “He’s late for tea! I thought he’d never come!” She heard father open the door and say, “Hello, Frizzy! Now where’s Jack?” He called out, “Jack! Where are you? Teatime!” but there was no response. Then he said to himself, “That’s odd! No sign of Jack, but Fizzy’s here, and the dog lead’s missing. What’s going on?”

Mother came to have a look, and noticed the watch dangling from Frizzy’s collar. “Oh!” she exclaimed, “Jack’s put it there for us to find! He’s in trouble somewhere, I can sense it! He send Frizzy home to get help! What shall we do?”

Father was inclined to think this was a load of nonsense, but he knew better than to argue. “Well, even if that’s the case”, he said, “what can we do about it?”

“You must go with Frizzy and he’ll lead us to where Jack is!” Seeing a look of reluctance on his face, she added, “If you don’t want to do it, I’ll go!”

“No, I’ll go”, he said, concealing his private belief that this was ridiculous. He selected a length of rope to act as a lead and tied one end through Frizzy’s collar. “Now then Frizzy, take us to where Jack is!” he commanded. “I hope this isn’t some damn stupid game of Jack’s!” he thought to himself.

The big labrador barked more frantically than ever as they passed its house, but Frizzy ignored him and trotted on. Eventually they came to the cows’ field and Frizzy waited for the gate to be opened.

“Are you sure this is right?” said Father. “Hello! Jack! Are you there?” he shouted, but there was no response. There seemed to be nothing he could do except trust Frizzy, so they set off across the field towards the wood.

Once again, the cows gathered round in a hostile manner. Father tried to shoo them away, but they quickly closed in again. Then one of them tried to tread on Frizzy. He jumped aside, but the animal’s hoof caught him a glancing blow on the front leg. Frizzy gave a piercing yelp of pain, which was answered by a faint and distant call from the wood.

Father scooped up Frizzy. “I’m coming, Jack!” he shouted, and he ran, faster than he had done for many years. He was very out of breath by the time they reached the fence and scrambled over it, but there was Jack; found at last!

He looked at Jack’s ankle. “I’m not sure if it’s broken or not, but it’s badly swollen and you certainly can’t walk on it”, he said. “We’ll just have to summon assistance and wait”. He took out his mobile phone, tried to dial a number, and cursed angrily.

“Dammit! No signal! What a time for it to give out on me! Right: I’ll have to carry you home!”

“But what about Frizzy?”

“I’m afraid Frizzy will just have to take his chances”.

“But Frizzy won’t ever get across the cow field with his leg. No, Father, I’m not leaving him. If it hadn’t been for Frizzy you’d never have found me. I’ll carry Frizzy if you can carry me.”

Father thought for a while and then said, “Yes, you’re right. We can’t leave him; not after what he’s done”.

Despite his pain, Jack managed a weak smile. “Do you think you can carry both of us, Father?”

“I’ll have to try, won’t I? We’ll manage somehow”.

In truth, Jack’s father was not at all looking forward to carrying the two of them, but he hoisted Jack onto his back and took Frizzy in his arms. “Off we go!” he said, “There’s no point in trying to cross the cows’ field: they hate dogs, and we'd never get through. There must be some other way out of this wood!”

They followed the line of the fence. It was rough under foot. Soon Frizzy was whimpering with pain and Jack was trying very hard not to cry. Just when Father was thinking he would have to give up, they found a gate which led to a farmyard. The farmer’s wife was able to make phone calls, and soon an ambulance came for Jack. Mother arrived too, to go with him to the hospital; but he didn’t want to leave until Father promised to take Frizzy to the vet at the same time.

Later, when Jack was sitting on the couch with his ankle strapped up, sipping a hot drink that Mother had given him, and stroking Frizzy, who had a bandage on his injured foot, Father said to him, “I think we’ve all learned some lessons from this, haven’t we? First, of course, you must promise us that you’ll never again wander off without telling us, right? But also, we thought you were very brave with your accident; and very clever too, thinking to put your watch through Frizzy’s collar. Without that we’d never have guessed you were hurt. I’m sure you’re going to be brave in the future too. It doesn’t matter if you feel frightened: everyone feels frightened sometimes. I don’t think you’ll be worried about people laughing at you after this. Just remember: you may be very frightened, but you can still be brave – as brave as little Frizzy was”.

“But you were brave too, Father”, said Jack.

“Oh, rubbish!” said Father. He laughed and ruffled Jack’s hair.